


Adventures in cat ownership

by Crimsoncat



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Domestic Fluff, F/F, The adventures of Liho the cat, blackhill - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-03-14
Updated: 2017-05-24
Packaged: 2018-10-04 19:55:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 3,567
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10288052
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Crimsoncat/pseuds/Crimsoncat
Summary: Some BlackHill fluff featuring Liho. Because why not?A series of one shots featuring everyone's favourite Avengers pet. The adventures of Liho!





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I have a million things I should be doing right now, but instead I'm writing about Liho. I would be very surprised if this didn't turn into a multi-chapter thing filled with random Liho encounters. I adore this little cat, and I really love writing about her. More Liho forever!
> 
> Anyway, enjoy! Let me know what you think :)

Maria glances up from the file she’s reading as the familiar sound of an incoming Skype call fills her office. She frowns, glancing at the clock as she picks up her phone and accepts the call. “Hey, what're you doing up?” Maria asks as Skype connects.

It takes a moment for the video to kick in, and when it does her frown morphs into a fond smile. Natasha is sprawled out in their bed, hair tousled and getting in her eyes as she blinks sleepily at the camera. She is absolutely adorable like this (though Maria isn't stupid enough to tell her that).

“You said you were just going in to grab a file Maria, what the fuck?”

Maria shrugs helplessly. “The op in Kiev went sideways. I'll be home soon,” she promises.

A loud and demanding cry echoes through their apartment and filters through Maria’s speakers. Natasha groans loudly as she dramatically throws the arm not holding her phone over her eyes. “You need to talk to your cat.”

“So she’s _my_ cat now?” Maria chuckles softly, and Natasha lifts her arm just enough to glare at Maria through the screen.

“Nothing about this is funny,” Natasha growls. “I've been up for three days, Maria. Three. Days. If I’d known you weren't going to be home I would have crashed at the tower.”

Liho releases another unhappy yowl, closer and louder than the last one, and Natasha groans again. The video tilts as Natasha rolls onto her side, dropping her hand over the bed as she snaps her fingers. “Liho!” Natasha calls. 

Maria glances at the file she had been reading before Natasha called. It isn't urgent, she decides. It can wait until tomorrow. Maria closes the file and begins to pack up her work as Natasha continues to call the cat to bed.

If Maria had been thinking, she would have stayed home. The Avengers had spent the past few days dealing with a Hydra cell in Brazil, and Maria had spent most of that time in the command center. She had gone home to feed Liho, and that was about it. After three days without them, Maria could understand why the little cat was being so difficult.

Natasha rolls back, propping her phone against Maria’s pillow and dropping Liho in front of it. The Russian curls up on her side, facing the camera, and Liho turns away from the phone to headbutt Natasha’s chin. “Merrp,” Liho chirps at her.

“She’s been screaming since you left,” Natasha mutters as she absently scratches behind Liho’s ears.

“Liho,” Maria calls, and the cat’s ears twitch towards the phone. “Liho,” Maria calls her name a second time, and the small cat glances towards her. Maria watches with amusement as Liho spots Maria on the screen and her eyes grow big. “You need to let Natasha sleep or she will murder us both,” Maria tries to explain.

Liho tilts her head and creeps closer to the phone. “Mrow?”

“Being murdered is bad,” Maria agrees in a soothing tone. “I'm leaving now, I'll be home in twenty minutes. Just behave for twenty minutes and we can play with Hawkeye.”

(Much to Clint’s horror, Natasha had found a small Hawkeye cat toy. It was unlicensed, so it only had a vague resemblance to Clint’s costume. (And it was actually called Hawk-Guy!) But it was still close enough to be hilarious.

Every time Clint came over to visit Liho would drop in in his lap, as if she somehow knew her favourite uncle and her favourite toy were one in the same.

Clint insisted it was some vague cat threat against his life.)

“Twenty minutes,” Maria promises them.

“Ten,” Natasha counters, eyes already closed and voice muffled by the edge of her pillow.

Maria turns off her computer screen and grabs her phone off the desk. “I'm walking out the door.”

Natasha hums quietly, and Liho settles down in front of the phone. Maria considers hanging up, but chooses instead to keep the connection open. If she can keep Liho amused maybe she’ll stay quiet long enough for Maria to get home. Natasha is asleep again before Maria reaches the elevator, and Liho continues to watch her walk down the hallway with interest.

Maria clips her phone into the holder attached to her car’s console and Liho watches her for most of the drive home, tilting her head at the street lights that flash past Maria’s windows. She wanders away from Natasha’s phone as Maria is pulling into their building’s parking garage, but the little cat stays quiet. Natasha continues to sleep peacefully, and Maria disconnects the call as she reaches their apartment and digs her keys out of her pocket. Liho prances around her ankles as Maria steps into the apartment and quietly closes and relocks the door.

“Mrrrrop!” Liho exclaims happily, stretching up Maria’s legs.

“I know, I know, I'm sorry.” Maria hangs up her coat and scoops the cat into her arms. Liho purrs happily and rubs her face against Maria’s chin.

They walk deeper into the apartment and Maria heads into the bedroom. Natasha is still curled towards her phone, still fast asleep. Maria puts Liho on the floor before reaching over the sleeping Russian. She puts Natasha’s phone on her nightstand and plugs it in for her.

“Hey,” Natasha murmurs sleepily.

“Hey,” Maria echoes softly. She sits on the edge of the bed as Natasha rolls towards her. “I didn't mean to wake you.”

Natasha glances towards the clock on the nightstand. “Eight minutes. I think that's a new record.”

“What good is having emergency lights on the car if you can't use them during an emergency?” Maria smiles, gently brushing unruly curls off of her girlfriend’s face.

Natasha blinks at her. “You used the emergency lights?”

“No,” Maria admits. “The roads were empty. But I would have!”

Natasha laughs quietly. “Come to bed.”

Liho jumps up between them, purring loudly as she climbs over Natasha and settles on the pillow next to her head. The Russian hums happily as Liho purrs into her ear, and Maria melts. They’re just so cute like this, sleepy and cuddly and absolutely adorable. She pulls out her phone and snaps a few pictures before she stands.

“I’ll be right back,” Maria tells them. Neither of them so much as twitch at her words, and Maria chuckles softly.

When Maria crawls into bed ten minutes later, Natasha shifts towards her. Maria lifts her arm and the Russian burrows into her side with a sound of contentment. “I missed you,” Natasha murmurs into her chest.

“I missed you too,” Maria brushes her lips against Natasha’s forehead. “I'm sorry it took me so long to get home.”

“You came when I called.”

“Always,” Maria promises.

Liho carefully crawls over them. The small cat curls up on Maria’s chest, where she tucks herself under Natasha’s chin and purrs happily. Maria lays one hand across their cat and strokes Natasha’s back with the other as the stress of the past few days slowly melts away.

There will be a lot to do tomorrow, but in this moment tomorrow feels distant and far away. Maria pushes work from her mind and listens to the soothing sounds of Liho’s purrs and Natasha’s quiet snores.

Maria falls asleep smiling, thankful to have everything she loves most in the world curled up safely in her arms.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It has been a long day, so apologies for all the typos I'm sure I missed.
> 
> You guys may be happy to hear that I'm full of ideas for Liho adventures, and this will probably be a thing I do for awhile.

Natasha glances away from Bucky as Liho goes skittering across the living room floor. She's obviously chasing something, though Natasha can't quite tell what it is. She looks back to Bucky and he shrugs at her, just as confused.

Liho slides to a stop and takes off in the opposite direction, nearly tripping Maria as she comes into the room.

“Damnit, Liho!” Maria exclaims as she stumbles. The drinks she's carrying slosh and drip down her hands, and Bucky leaps up to help her. He takes the drinks from Maria so she can dry her hands with the napkin Natasha offers. Liho spins desperately in tight circles.

“What the hell has gotten into her?” Natasha wonders, bewildered by Liho’s insanity.

Liho is a well behaved and mostly reasonable cat. She loses her mind occasionally, sure, but usually there's a toy involved. Or _something_ that can be explained. She has never just gone crazy like this for no reason. The three of them watch as Liho freezes, intently focused on something they can't see. She crouches down and stalks forward slowly.

Bucky hands Natasha her drink before he sits back down, and Liho bounds across the floor. She pounces on a tiny pinprick of light sparkling against the dark wood, paws pressed tightly against the floor to keep it trapped. Bucky sips his drink and Liho watches with obvious disappointment as the light shoots out from under her paws.

Liho’s expression is easy to read, practically screaming out - _But I just killed you!_

Maria laughs loudly as she realizes what's going on. Liho glances towards her, startled, but quickly turns back to her prey. Natasha and Bucky catch on moments later, and Bucky laughs as he shifts his metallic arm. The spot of light jumps across the floor and Liho goes racing after it.

The sun reflecting off of Bucky’s arm creates a dozen little points of light around the room, and Liho is desperate to murder them all. Bucky moves his arm again and the three of them laugh as Liho scrabbles from one point of light to the next.

After ten minutes of this Liho begins to tire. She eventually collapses on her side, paw outstretched towards the nearest speck of light, and releases a tired “mrrrow” full of longing.

Bucky takes pity on her and moves his arm a smidge to the left, sending the light dancing towards her. Liho doesn't get up, but she does slap her paw down on it. The small cat watches her paw intently for a few moments to make sure it didn't escape, but her eyes begin to drift shut. Killing spots of light is hard work, after all.

“No wonder Liho is always so happy when you come to visit,” Maria chuckles as she pulls out her phone. “You're a walking cat toy.”

“I can't believe we never noticed,” Bucky adds, lips stretched into an amused smile as he relaxes his arm. The light escapes Liho’s hold, but she's completely passed out at that point and doesn't notice.

“We should get her a tiny disco ball or something." Natasha tilts her head as she considers the sleeping cat. “She would lose her mind.”

Maria grins and nods towards her phone. “Way ahead of you, babe.”

 

*

 

The disco ball arrives two days later, and Liho watches her mothers unpack the box with interest. It's too small for her to climb into, but Liho still sticks her face and a paw inside the box as she tries to figure out a way to make it work.

She's distracted from her scheming once the disco ball is set up. Liho stares in wide eyed amazement as the room is covered in tiny sparkling squares of light. Natasha taps the disco ball to get it spinning, and Liho leaps into action.

Natasha and Maria sit together on the couch, curled against one another as their cat dashes across the room. Liho chirps happily as she pounces and spins, attempting to slay as many of the little squares of light as she can while her mothers laugh at her antics.

Sometimes being a cat is _awesome_.


	3. Chapter 3

“We should be there in about 40 minutes,” Fury remarks as the quinjet levels out and autopilot takes over.

Maria nods absently as she unbuckles her harness. “I'm going to grab a bottle of water. Do you want anything?”

“Did Jensen restock those little chocolate things?”

“Jensen enjoys having a job, so I'm going to go with yes.”

Fury snorts and Maria smiles at him fondly. Everyone knows you don't let the Director of SHIELD board a quinjet without refilling the snack bar first. Fury loves the caramel chocolate squares that the quinjets carry. It's a small thing that makes Fury happy, and it's well worth the extra check on the maintenance team’s list. With all that Fury does for them the least the SHIELD agents can do is make sure he has access to his favourite candy before he takes a jet out.

Maria makes her way out of the cockpit and into the cabin of the jet in search of snacks. The sun is just starting to rise and there hadn't been time for breakfast before they’d taken off. They have an appointment in DC to defend and explain SHIELD’s response to the latest alien threat, and Maria isn't looking forward to the next couple of days. She hates dealing with politicians. Sure, they’ll need to spend an exorbitant amount of money repairing the damage to certain parts of New York. (Again.) But what else were they supposed to do, exactly?

Some property damage seems like a fair trade for saving the world. (Again.) Unfortunately, the various governments don't always agree.

Maria exhales in annoyance as she pulls open a compartment built into the body of the jet. She pulls out two bottles of cold water, a handful of Fury’s chocolates, and two energy bars. The breakfast of champions! Maria shakes her head and makes a mental note to grab a real breakfast before they have to deal with any politicians.

Closing the compartment is a bit harder with her hands so full and it takes her a moment. Maria uses her elbow to get it closed, but that extra moment turns out to be a gift. That's when she hears it, the one sound that absolutely never ever belongs on a quinjet. It's faint and barely there, but it's unmistakable.

“Mrrrrow!”

Maria almost drops her armful of snacks. She stands there for a moment, stunned. Maria has just enough time to wonder if she's hallucinating when it happens again.

“Mrrrrrow!” It's louder, a bit more desperate, and Maria would know that sound anywhere.

“..Liho?”

“MRROW!” Liho cries loudly in response.

Maria drops her snacks and rushes towards the other side of the cabin. She pulls the luggage compartment open and digs frantically for her bag. Maria pushes past the garment bags that hold her dress and Fury’s suit for an event they’ll be attending tonight and she carelessly shoves Fury’s small bag to the side. Maria’s bag moves and she swears loudly as she reaches for it.

Liho sticks her head out of the bag as soon as the zipper has been opened far enough for her to fit. She tries to claw her way to freedom before it's even half open, and Maria carefully helps pull her out of the bag. Liho clings to her even as she looks around the quinjet with obvious interest.

“Maow.” Liho remarks, head butting Maria’s cheek almost as an afterthought.

“Oh, what the fuck,” Maria groans.

She knows exactly what happened. Liho loves sleeping in open luggage, like most cats do. Maria had removed Liho from her bag at least half a dozen times as she was packing the night before, and she knows the cat wasn't in her bag when she set it by the door last night.

But Maria shoved a book into her bag this morning, and she left it unzipped while she said goodbye to Natasha. Apparently giving Liho the perfect opportunity to climb in and make herself at home.

Liho pushes against Maria’s chest, squirming as she tries to jump down. After a quick mental check of the quinjet, confident that there isn't anything Liho can get into, Maria puts her on the floor. Liho twines herself around Maria’s ankles before moving away to sniff at one of the forgotten bottles of water. The plane tilts ever so slightly and the water bottle rolls away from her. Liho chases after it happily.

Maria puts away her luggage and heads back over to the compartment full of snacks. They don't have cat food, but they do have all the things you’d need to make a sandwich. Maria grabs a package of sliced turkey, and then she wanders around the cabin picking up the snacks she’d dropped. Liho protests when Maria picks up the bottle of water she was chasing around the room.

“If you wanted toys you should have stayed at home,” Maria mutters. Liho just blinks up at her. Maria shakes her head and moves back towards the cockpit with Liho following closely behind her.

Maria hands Fury his half of breakfast before collapsing into her co-pilot seat. Maria puts the rest of her items on the tray that slides out of her armrest, and Liho jumps into her lap as soon as there’s room. Maria rubs tiredly at her eyes.

“...Hill?”

“Yes’ir?”

“There's a cat on my plane.”

“Yes’ir,” Maria agrees.

“Mrrp,” Liho adds.

Fury’s chair turns towards her. “Maria. Why is there a cat on my plane?”

“Because I wanted a book to read.”

Fury watches them and waits to see if Maria will decide to make sense. Maria just shrugs as she reaches past Liho for the package of turkey. Maria feeds small pieces to Liho, who scarfs it down eagerly. At this point Liho has been in Maria’s bag for at least three hours, completely missing her usual breakfast time. (Maria really hopes Liho at least used the litterbox before she climbed in and went to sleep.)

“Alright then,” Fury says slowly.

He reaches for a chocolate, and Liho’s head whips around at the crinkle of the wrapper. Before Maria can stop her Liho leaps from Maria’s chair to Fury’s, reaching out a little paw to bat at the chocolate wrapper held tight between his fingers.

Liho looks up at him. “Maow?”

Fury chuckles and balls up the wrapper. He tosses it onto the floor and Liho jumps down after it, batting the makeshift toy around in the space between their seats.

“I’m assuming this wasn't planned?” Fury looks over at Maria.

“Not even a little bit,” Maria sighs.

Liho ignores them and chases her wrapper into the other room.

Fury pulls on his headset and connects to the agents waiting for them at the DC airport. Maria listens as he requests various cat supplies, and makes sure there will be a carrier waiting for them when they land. While he does that she pulls out her phone and texts Natasha to let her know where Liho is. Natasha, who had assumed Liho was just out roaming the neighbourhood, is stunned.

Maria knows _exactly_ how she feels.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you're enjoying the adventures of Liho so far, let me know what you think! You can also find me on Tumblr as Crimsoncat21 if you want to send me your Liho headcanons or ideas for her adventures :)


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And another post tonight. Because when I'm sleep deprived and in a mood I write. Enjoy!

_Tch click tch click_

Maria glances up from her book and watches Liho pad out of the livingroom. She glances over at Natasha who seems to suddenly be very invested in the TV.

“I thought you were going to trim her nails?” Maria asks.

Natasha shrugs. “I was, but then this came on. You know how much I love… this show.”

Maria glances at the random reality show on their television. “If you can give me just one of their names I’ll trim her nails for you.”

“Er.” Natasha blinks. “...Jessica?”

Maria laughs and nudges Natasha’s hip with her foot. “Go get the cat.”

“Damnit. Jessica is a **very** popular name,” Natasha mutters.”

“Uh-huh,” Maria agrees easily as she nudges Natasha again. “Get to it, or I'm telling everyone you're afraid of trimming Liho’s nails.”

Natasha glares at her. “They're _sharp_ , Maria.”

“Last week you were fighting mutant wolves in Central Park,” Maria reminds her gently.

“Am I allowed to shock Liho into submission?”

“No! You are not allowed to use any of your Black Widow gear on our cat!”

“Then its not really comparable, is it?”

Maria blinks at her for a moment before she bursts out laughing. “Oh my god go trim her nails you big baby.”

Natasha wanders off muttering angrily to herself, and Maria listens as she attempts to convince Liho that getting your nails trimmed isn't _that_ bad.

Maria winces as Natasha hisses in pain and Liho just hisses. It takes the assassin twenty minutes, and when she wanders back into the room there are a number of scratches on her arms and hands.

“That wasn't so bad, was it?” Maria asks cautiously.

“Next time I'm shocking her into submission,” Natasha sighs.

“Nat, no,” Maria laughs.

“Just a little shock. Teeny tiny.”

Maria shakes her head and goes back to reading her book. Natasha groans loudly as she settles back into her seat. Things are quiet for a moment. Maria is reading and Natasha is sulking, and Liho is off trying to reclaim her dignity. The only sound in the room is the TV, so they are both able to hear the host perfectly when he turns to the camera.

“If Jess can win this challenge she’ll have immunity for tonight’s vote,” the host stage whispers.

Maria goes very still as Natasha’s mouth falls open. The Russian sputters wordlessly for a moment, slapping Maria’s leg and gesturing towards the TV.

“I don't watch this either!” Maria exclaims. “How would I know what their names are?”

“You are doing her nails for a month!” Natasha shouts, finally finding her voice. “A _month_ , Maria!”

Maria begins to laugh and quickly pulls her leg out of the way when Natasha goes to slap it again.


End file.
